Voice of the people (letter).

Racist Assumption

February 09, 1997|By Amanda Seligman.

EVANSTON — I am appalled that the Tribune's editorial standards permit the description of a biracial child drawing a family tree as using "flesh- and black-colored pencils." What is it that makes one side of her family the color of "flesh" and the other "black"? Only white arrogance.

It is more than simply ironic that this description appears under the headline "King's wish a reality at festivities" (Metro). Until white people stop thinking of themselves as being the default condition-- and assuming everyone who is not white deviates from a standard set by whites--then such pronouncements are premature. By failing to acknowledge that all of us are the color of flesh, the Tribune perpetuates the racism that Martin Luther King and many others worked to overcome.